The
Creation of the World As told by the Bards and Priests

n
the beginning there was only the gods and the heavens, wherein
they all lived. Of these gods Va, Nokton, and Ilotoli were the
oldest and greatest, and each had begotten other gods which
followed them.

Of
the greater gods Nokton was most inclined towards jealousy and
strife. Va, on the other hand, was the most beautiful and gracious
of them, and Nokton hated her for this. Thus he sought to quarrel
with her and to tempt her followers to his side.

This
had gone for a long time when finally Va and Ilotoli had had
enough and ultimately bade Nokton to cease, but still he refused.
So Va and Ilotoli with their combined power banned Noktion and
his followers into the deepest and darkest corner of the heavens.
Ilotoli then bade his most inventive follower, Pantomos, to
build a secure prison for them. So Pantomos took a stone from
the sky and with it he created the earth which covered that
dark hole, which was to be named the Underworld thereafter.
But Nokton raged deep below with such ferocity that the earth
trembled and even cracked in places. Pantomos, fearing Nokton
would break out, squeezed out the water from his stone to fill
the cracks and sinks in the earth. Still, Nokton's terrible
shrieks could be heard even far above in the heavens, so Pantomos
opened up the stone to let out the air so that it would howl
and whistle when it blew across the earth and water and would
drown out Nokton's screams. Finally, Nokton began slamming his
fists into the earth from below, so that it bulged there and
would burst open. Pantomos reacted quickly and and made sparks
with the stone to set the places afire where Nokton was breaking
through so that he would burn his hands and could not continue.
Thus had Pantomos created the four elements, and the place wherein
they lay he named Arthia, after the first element of creation.

Jhia,
Va's daughter, saw what Pantomos had created, and thought that
it, although functional, was a sore sight to the heavens and
needed some improvement. Thus she decorated the lands with plants
of all shapes and sizes. The seas and the air would not hold
any plants so instead she filled them with creatures that would
swim and fly. Then, when she saw how lively and full of grace
they were she made creatures to fill the lands too.

When
Va saw what Jhia had done she was very pleased. She rewarded
Jhia by making her light in the sky second only to herself,
so that she may take her own place when she herself was resting,
and finally she imbued the greatest of Jhia's creatures with
spirit and wisdom, so that they would worship her. These children
were called the ancients and were the first people of the lands,
and indeed they were wise and full of devout worship to Jhia.

All
this had not gone unnoticed to the other gods, even to Nokton,
who could hear what was going on through places where the earth
was thin, and it made him very jealous for he was very vain
and wanted to have his own people to worship him. So he whispered
thoughts of jealousy to Pantomos and made him want to have his
own people too, and he suggested Pantomos capture some of the
ancients and hide them in the earth. So Pantomos did this and
shaped his captives so that they could live better under the
earth. These became the people of the earth, and were named
dwarves, and they were taught by Pantomos to love the earth
and how to forge and create things with it. Of these there came
to be a group which lusted even greater than the others for
the treasures of the earth and thus dug so deeply in search
of such that they came within Nokton's grasp. Delighted that
his plan had worked Nokton imprisoned the group and made them
his own. With time they became as hideous and ugly as they were
at heart until they bore no resemblance anymore to the other
people of the earth, and thus were called orcs. Nokton then
made these the means to his revenge on the other gods and send
the orcs out to destroy the other peoples. The orcs came near
to complete success with only the most resilient dwarves surviving
and those of the ancients that had fled to the forests where
Jhia could protect them best. Then Va intervened and had Aian
teach the secret of magic to the remaining ancients, so that
they and the dwarves could drive the orcs back. Va then, in
order to end the envy among the other gods, took two of the
plainest ones of the ancients and declared that these would
found a fruitful people to inhabit the lands everywhere and
that these people would be diverse in their choice of worship,
so that all gods would have people that worshipped them. These
people were named humans, and those of the ancients that had
fled to the forests remained there and became the elves. But
still some of the gods were not satisfied, for they wanted to
have people that were also shaped to their own resemblance and
liking. So Va created the Altar of Origin with a pool of nectar,
that would give spirit and knowledge to any creature that came
by and drank of it. Many gods then led their favorite creatures
to the Altar and thus many races were created, but also were
many founded by creatures that happened to find the place.